Mero-Schmidlin Totally Explained

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The MERO spaceframe

In the late 1930s, a German entrepreneur, Dr Ing. Max Mengeringhausen (1903–1988), developed a method of recreating the structural methods used in the natural world into construction technology, enabling structures to be built with huge spans between supports, in a lightweight and economical yet strong way. In 1943, a company was set up under the name MEngeringhausen ROhrbauweise ("Mengeringhausen's tubular structures") to produce the structures that Mengeringhausen had invented. In the Stadt von Morgen hall of the 1957 Berlin International Construction Fair, Professor Karl Otto presented the construction shapes of the future, with MERO's construction methods being highly emphasised.
   Using individual hollow steel tubes connected at points into steel balls (nodes), in a predetermined geometry, the MERO spaceframe pioneered a new method of construction, opening up a whole range of possibilities for construction. All loads onto the structure are taken at the node points, reducing structural issues of lateral loading and buckling of the tube members. By using bolted connections between tube and node, MERO's spaceframe system had the advantage of requiring no on-site welding during construction, and all components could be shipped in crates before being assembled on site, reducing transportation and packaging costs and also making the system well suited for hard-to-access locations.
   Using bespoke geometry with the spaceframe system, complex domes, pyramids, and free-form shapes could be developed.
   The simple idea behind the spaceframe geometry and construction methods enabled it to be easily adapted to other markets, and during the 1960s, the MERO spaceframe system was developed into the market areas of raised access floors and aircraft dock maintenance frames.
   When the patents to the MERO spaceframe construction system lapsed in the 1970s, rival companies began using Mengeringhausen's method of construction. Today, many companies worldwide offer spaceframe construction systems based on the MERO tube-and-node method.

Notable MERO space frame structures

Stockholm Globe Arena, Sweden - Dome with diameter of 110 m (1989)
National Indoor Arena, Birmingham, UK - 128x90m single span spaceframe roof (1990)
The Eden Project, Cornwall, UK - Biome structures
The Glasgow Science Centre, Glasgow, Scotland, UK - Exhibition Hall and 3D Cinema to the Building Design Partnership designed science park (2001)

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